This past Spring semester, I presented at the Writing & Speaking Studio Tutor Perspectives event alongside my fellow peer consultants. The event allows tutors to share our experiences of helping our peers develop connections with their work and confidence to make choices that balance convention and individuality. We also reflect on how we as tutors affirm students' diverse learning and communication experiences, as well as how professors can alter their teaching styles to be more mindful of their student's diverse needs. The following is my script for the event:
A TUTOR'S PERSPECTIVE:
Promoting Linguistic Diversity in Academic Writing
April 19, 2023
April 19, 2023
From my first day as a Peer Writing & Speaking Consultant, I have engaged in a range of compelling and diverse conversations at the studio. Among them, the topic of tutoring multilingual students has caught my particular interest. Despite being multilingual myself, English is my native language, which limits my ability to fully relate to non-native English-speaking students. Nevertheless, my diverse background as a person of color who was not born and raised in the United States provides me with a unique perspective that many monolingual people may lack. Our recent readings about working with multilingual students articulated a lot of concepts that really resonated with me, particularly the notion that Writing Centers can do more to support multilingual students in developing agency in their writings. Rather than being, “passive recipients of knowledge,", these students should be empowered to shape their own writing processes and have the opportunities to learn from their “mistakes” (Olson 4). This idea, expressed by Bobbi Olson in their article titled, “Rethinking Our Work with Multilingual Writers: The Ethics and Responsibility of Language Teaching in the Writing Center," aligns with my passion for helping students from diverse, linguistic backgrounds thrive in academia.
Olson, a writing center director, explores the idea that Writing Centers can inadvertently perpetuate the idea of being, what Geller et al refer to as, the, quote, "gatekeeper of academic literacy," end quote, as there is often a pressure to conform to institutional standards and to assist non-native English writers to write more like native English speakers. Olson explains, quote, “In providing tips and strategies for helping multilingual writers meet instructors’ (monolingual) expectations, for instance, we have failed to help multilingual writers thrive as individuals and writers with agency”, end quote (Olson 2). This articulated for me that, as both tutors and people, it is our ethical responsibility to ensure that we are not discouraging multilingual writers from expressing themselves in their own unique voices and perspectives.
This topic is of particular interest to me because I have personally experienced pressure to adhere to institutional writing standards, which significantly altered my writing style. During my freshman year of high school, my English teacher had exceedingly high expectations for his students. He expected us to write at the college level, even though we were only 14 years old because he believed that this would prepare us for the future. I spent days drafting and re-drafting the same essay just to get the same response: “This is not good enough”. Eventually, he provided us with a sample paper written by a former student, a paper he described as “perfect.” So, exhausted from never meeting his standards and terrified that I was going to fail my final, I decided to rewrite the sample paper with my own evidence and analysis for the play we were discussing, and I memorized it. On the day of the final, I wrote my essay and left within 20 minutes, and I ended up with a 94. At the time, I was ecstatic because I thought that I had cracked the code -- I figured out how to ace a test without even trying, and I had the perfect template for every paper I had to write moving forward. But, looking back, that was probably the worst thing that could have happened to me as a writer. It stripped my writing of my personality and voice, as if it were written by AI. Over time, I stopped using that template, mostly because it didn’t apply to the topics I had to write about moving forward, but it still ingrained in me the idea that my writing was “not good enough,” and that I had to conform to institutional standards in order to get a good grade. More than that though, it made me extremely anxious to write at all. To this day, it takes me hours to write just one paragraph because I overthink every word, punctuation mark, and sentence, wondering if it’s “good enough” and hoping I don’t sound stupid. I know this is not an experience unique to me; it’s a symptom of a larger, systemic issue where students are conditioned to conform to standards imposed by native English speakers, whether that be a professor or their peers.
As a native English speaker, I try my best to adhere to these standards, and though it is a struggle, it does not come as hard for me because I am fluent in the language. However, taking multilingual students’ perspectives into consideration, one can only imagine how stressful it can be to have to adhere to these standards and how much anxiety they may have when having to write or present, especially when English isn’t their first language. In her article titled, “Stocking the Bodega: Towards a New Writing Center Paradigm,” Nancy Effinger Wilson describes, quote, “When I was an undergraduate, I was told that I did not belong in college—implicitly by my family and neighbors whose poverty and lack of education had convinced them that such ‘high falutin’ aspirations were ‘not for the likes of us,’ but also explicitly by my professors who found my inability to produce ‘Standard’ English and formal academic writing an indicator of my general ignorance… I just accepted that my ‘inferior’ language needed replacing”, end quote (6). This feeling of “shame and anxiety” is shared by many multilingual and monolingual writers, especially when their professors are enforcing their standards on students, despite the students’ diverse backgrounds. This experience highlights one of many challenges that multilingual students face in academic writing, further expressing the need for Writing Centers and professors to take a more empowering approach that recognizes and values the diverse linguistic backgrounds of their students.
Both Wilson and Olson discuss in their articles the significance of the role a Writing Center has when it comes to its ability to influence faculty to question their grading standards. Wilson expresses how a social work professor added a statement to her graduate social work syllabus that allowed students to express themselves in a way that allows, "maximum self-expression” without requiring Edited Standard Written English (ESWE). The professor's students were visibly relieved by this change as they now felt more liberated in expressing their opinions and ideas without overthinking or worrying about conforming to a specific writing style. The experience reminded me of a recent conversation I had with a friend who was using ChatGPT to help her improve her writing. When I asked her why she felt the need to use AI to help her write an Art History paper, she expressed that, as a non-native, English-speaking, multilingual student, she often feels anxious about her writing style out of fear of, her words verbatim, “sounding stupid.” What stood out to me was that she didn’t ask the software to write the paper for her, she asked it to help her provide better clarity and “improve the overall flow and structure” of her work. I was quick to compare this interaction with a session between a peer consultant and a student. However, in this case, the AI software could not help her understand why it was making those changes and, in correcting her “mistakes," it also depleted her work of her unique voice. I asked her if she would feel more comfortable writing if her professor expressed that the students did not have to adhere to "standard" English and that their grades would be based solely on the content of their writing rather than the form. Without hesitation, she said, “yes.”
I have heard similar worries from several multilingual students at the Writing & Speaking Studio who struggle with writing due to the pressure of conforming to standard English. Many of them detach themselves from their work out of fear of failure and frustration with their inability to clearly communicate their thoughts and opinions. They don't engage in developing their writing processes or incorporating their unique voices and perspectives because they believe that doing so will result in poor grades. Instead of actively working with me to edit their writings, they ask me to "fix" it for them, which removes their unique voices. If we continue to scare students into writing the way we want them to, we must ask the question: at what point does the writing become mine, or yours, and not theirs? Especially considering the fact that, a lot of the time, the mistakes that they’re making aren’t merely punctuation or grammar, but overall sentence structure and clarity, which means that we are often rewriting the entire piece. When I have a session with a student who is detached from their work or struggling to find their voice as an English-language writer, I often encourage them to use Google Translate, which allows them to express their thoughts in a language that they are fluent in and allows the writing to sound more like them rather than a machine. The conversation we have after using Google Translate, wherein I help them edit the minor mistakes and improve their clarity, not only helps them understand how to use the tool effectively, but also helps them build their voices as writers. I have found that this process helps students feel much more comfortable with their writing process and improves the tone of the piece. Most importantly though, students feel much more confident in their writing and feel less anxious about writing in the future.
It is very evident, in many ways, that both writing centers and faculty need to adapt to the diverse needs of students and embrace the knowledge that they bring to the writing process. I think Bobbi Olson says it perfectly at the end of their article:, quote “Examining how writing center practitioners can support student writers in their academic writing while at the same time paying attention to student writers’ lived experiences and the nuances of language teaching benefits all student writers. All student writers deserve to be heard on their own terms as they try to negotiate and understand the expectations placed on them from without. Although we cannot change the institution overnight, we can help writers exert agency. In doing so, we contribute to developing a world that is more responsive and reflective of its increasingly globalized population” end quote (5).
Olson, a writing center director, explores the idea that Writing Centers can inadvertently perpetuate the idea of being, what Geller et al refer to as, the, quote, "gatekeeper of academic literacy," end quote, as there is often a pressure to conform to institutional standards and to assist non-native English writers to write more like native English speakers. Olson explains, quote, “In providing tips and strategies for helping multilingual writers meet instructors’ (monolingual) expectations, for instance, we have failed to help multilingual writers thrive as individuals and writers with agency”, end quote (Olson 2). This articulated for me that, as both tutors and people, it is our ethical responsibility to ensure that we are not discouraging multilingual writers from expressing themselves in their own unique voices and perspectives.
This topic is of particular interest to me because I have personally experienced pressure to adhere to institutional writing standards, which significantly altered my writing style. During my freshman year of high school, my English teacher had exceedingly high expectations for his students. He expected us to write at the college level, even though we were only 14 years old because he believed that this would prepare us for the future. I spent days drafting and re-drafting the same essay just to get the same response: “This is not good enough”. Eventually, he provided us with a sample paper written by a former student, a paper he described as “perfect.” So, exhausted from never meeting his standards and terrified that I was going to fail my final, I decided to rewrite the sample paper with my own evidence and analysis for the play we were discussing, and I memorized it. On the day of the final, I wrote my essay and left within 20 minutes, and I ended up with a 94. At the time, I was ecstatic because I thought that I had cracked the code -- I figured out how to ace a test without even trying, and I had the perfect template for every paper I had to write moving forward. But, looking back, that was probably the worst thing that could have happened to me as a writer. It stripped my writing of my personality and voice, as if it were written by AI. Over time, I stopped using that template, mostly because it didn’t apply to the topics I had to write about moving forward, but it still ingrained in me the idea that my writing was “not good enough,” and that I had to conform to institutional standards in order to get a good grade. More than that though, it made me extremely anxious to write at all. To this day, it takes me hours to write just one paragraph because I overthink every word, punctuation mark, and sentence, wondering if it’s “good enough” and hoping I don’t sound stupid. I know this is not an experience unique to me; it’s a symptom of a larger, systemic issue where students are conditioned to conform to standards imposed by native English speakers, whether that be a professor or their peers.
As a native English speaker, I try my best to adhere to these standards, and though it is a struggle, it does not come as hard for me because I am fluent in the language. However, taking multilingual students’ perspectives into consideration, one can only imagine how stressful it can be to have to adhere to these standards and how much anxiety they may have when having to write or present, especially when English isn’t their first language. In her article titled, “Stocking the Bodega: Towards a New Writing Center Paradigm,” Nancy Effinger Wilson describes, quote, “When I was an undergraduate, I was told that I did not belong in college—implicitly by my family and neighbors whose poverty and lack of education had convinced them that such ‘high falutin’ aspirations were ‘not for the likes of us,’ but also explicitly by my professors who found my inability to produce ‘Standard’ English and formal academic writing an indicator of my general ignorance… I just accepted that my ‘inferior’ language needed replacing”, end quote (6). This feeling of “shame and anxiety” is shared by many multilingual and monolingual writers, especially when their professors are enforcing their standards on students, despite the students’ diverse backgrounds. This experience highlights one of many challenges that multilingual students face in academic writing, further expressing the need for Writing Centers and professors to take a more empowering approach that recognizes and values the diverse linguistic backgrounds of their students.
Both Wilson and Olson discuss in their articles the significance of the role a Writing Center has when it comes to its ability to influence faculty to question their grading standards. Wilson expresses how a social work professor added a statement to her graduate social work syllabus that allowed students to express themselves in a way that allows, "maximum self-expression” without requiring Edited Standard Written English (ESWE). The professor's students were visibly relieved by this change as they now felt more liberated in expressing their opinions and ideas without overthinking or worrying about conforming to a specific writing style. The experience reminded me of a recent conversation I had with a friend who was using ChatGPT to help her improve her writing. When I asked her why she felt the need to use AI to help her write an Art History paper, she expressed that, as a non-native, English-speaking, multilingual student, she often feels anxious about her writing style out of fear of, her words verbatim, “sounding stupid.” What stood out to me was that she didn’t ask the software to write the paper for her, she asked it to help her provide better clarity and “improve the overall flow and structure” of her work. I was quick to compare this interaction with a session between a peer consultant and a student. However, in this case, the AI software could not help her understand why it was making those changes and, in correcting her “mistakes," it also depleted her work of her unique voice. I asked her if she would feel more comfortable writing if her professor expressed that the students did not have to adhere to "standard" English and that their grades would be based solely on the content of their writing rather than the form. Without hesitation, she said, “yes.”
I have heard similar worries from several multilingual students at the Writing & Speaking Studio who struggle with writing due to the pressure of conforming to standard English. Many of them detach themselves from their work out of fear of failure and frustration with their inability to clearly communicate their thoughts and opinions. They don't engage in developing their writing processes or incorporating their unique voices and perspectives because they believe that doing so will result in poor grades. Instead of actively working with me to edit their writings, they ask me to "fix" it for them, which removes their unique voices. If we continue to scare students into writing the way we want them to, we must ask the question: at what point does the writing become mine, or yours, and not theirs? Especially considering the fact that, a lot of the time, the mistakes that they’re making aren’t merely punctuation or grammar, but overall sentence structure and clarity, which means that we are often rewriting the entire piece. When I have a session with a student who is detached from their work or struggling to find their voice as an English-language writer, I often encourage them to use Google Translate, which allows them to express their thoughts in a language that they are fluent in and allows the writing to sound more like them rather than a machine. The conversation we have after using Google Translate, wherein I help them edit the minor mistakes and improve their clarity, not only helps them understand how to use the tool effectively, but also helps them build their voices as writers. I have found that this process helps students feel much more comfortable with their writing process and improves the tone of the piece. Most importantly though, students feel much more confident in their writing and feel less anxious about writing in the future.
It is very evident, in many ways, that both writing centers and faculty need to adapt to the diverse needs of students and embrace the knowledge that they bring to the writing process. I think Bobbi Olson says it perfectly at the end of their article:, quote “Examining how writing center practitioners can support student writers in their academic writing while at the same time paying attention to student writers’ lived experiences and the nuances of language teaching benefits all student writers. All student writers deserve to be heard on their own terms as they try to negotiate and understand the expectations placed on them from without. Although we cannot change the institution overnight, we can help writers exert agency. In doing so, we contribute to developing a world that is more responsive and reflective of its increasingly globalized population” end quote (5).